Why You Need to Niche in a Global Economy

 

 

 

 

The Most Important Theory of All Time

(and How it Protects You Against Failure & Guarantees You Success)

“This case deserves to be a classic.”  Sherlock Holmes  (Arthur Conan Doyle, The Sign of Four)

“Eliminate all other factors, and the one which remains must be the truth.” Sherlock Holmes (Arthur Conan Doyle, The Sign of Four)

“Knowing where one belongs can transform an ordinary person -hardworking and competent but otherwise mediocre- into an outstanding performer” (p. 7)  (Drucker, 1999)

 If you have this one factor in your life, you will be successful.  In fact, it will help you grow fuller heads of hair, improve your eyesight, decrease wrinkles, increase your IQ, and make ecstasy happen without drugs.

You will be so happy you will smile in traffic, sing on key in the shower, and never have to argue with spellcheck again.  As an entrepreneur, you will never need another ounce of capital, never worry about cash flow, and never have another employee headache.

The Best Evidence for Your Success!

Okay.  Okay.  Before I perjure myself, I guess I better not exaggerate the evidence.  It is imminently impressive without any exaggeration.  Harvard Business Review  ^[i] conducted a study to determine what created professional success.

After studying 360,000 employed people (Wow!  Almost half a million!), for 19 years, across 14 industries, and several continents, the researchers factored success down to only one variable.  Are you curious about the THE number one secret of life, professional, and business success?  Drum roll.

Drum Roll, Please

But wait.  First, let me tell you all of the factors examined.  The researchers looked at race, gender, education, experience, and Earning Environment Fit.  We already know that race and gender don’t matter, but we often think that education and experience do.  But none of those factors was the key.

Nothing could be entered into evidence as relevant for your success—financial and otherwise–except one thing:  a Fit with your niche.  The entire study was encapsulated in these words: “Success hinges on the Fit”^[ii].

If who and what you are Fits who and what the job requires, you will succeed.  If not, you won’t.  It’s that simple.  Being in the professional place that “Fits you” propels you toward spectacular success. (And yes, education and experience do matter—IF they are within Fit.)

The Niche Secret:  The Only One You Will Ever Need to Succeed

Though that study was done years ago, professional Fit was first proposed even earlier in the twentieth century by Frank Parsons [iii].  Parsons was an engineer trained at Cornell ^[iv] doing community work, certainly an unlikely beginning for someone who was ultimately to be called the Father of Vocational Guidance.

Parsons knew that anyone could bring home the bread, the bacon, the dollar, yen or thex, if you had Fit.  Parsons became the director of the “The Breadwinner’s Institute” ^[v] where he initiated a program that ultimately became the first niche program at Harvard—all based on the premise of Fit ^[vi].

Research tells us specifically that when you are in “fit,” you will have 22 different benefits and avoid 11 different pitfalls (more on this in a minute).  I will examine these benefits and liabilities and show you the timeless Principle of Fit.

Professional Fit still prevails today as the most popular, useful, and most heavily researched niche theory of all time.  Fit is the ultimate synergy.  The Ultimate Profit Center.  The greatest Point of Leverage.  The Optimum confluence of your uniqueness and the uniqueness of the opportunity of your time

Researchers have continued to validate the importance of Niche Fit in study after study that is so numerous it would take a book (which I have written..smile) just to cite them all.  They all validate a secret that you instinctively know:  You will do better in a niche where you Fit.

 

 

The Foundation of Fit

The Foundation of Fit should underscore everything you do professionally.  It is THE most well-researched and documented business niche and career theory of all time.   Nothing else even comes close. I could give you mountains of data (and don’t you think for a minute I’m going to resist that temptation), but for now, let’s just cut to the chase.

If your professional life is built on the Foundation of Fit, YOU WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. Is it really that simple?  I promise!

Here are the Benefits of being in the Your and Liabilities of  Not being in your zone of fit.

Fit requires 3 Knowledges:  Self Knowledge, Market Knowledge, and Fit Knowledge.  You get those 3 unique Knowledges right, success will follow.  Kazaaam.  Let’s do it!

 

Now, let’s apply the Foundation of Fit to your Unique Zone of Fit.

Customer Fit and Topic Fit

Purpose:

Purpose is the Big Picture.  You are here for a reason and your gifts are needed.

People who are clear about their purpose live healthier and longer lives, endure difficult circumstances, contribute more to others, and are more profitable in their businesses.

• In a study done at a Japanese university, researchers found that those who had a sense of purpose had a lowered risk for heart attacks and a lower mortality rate.
• The Jewish psychiatrist and concentration survivor, Victor Frankl, found that having a strong sense of purpose kept people alive in extremely difficult circumstances.
• Adam Grant, a psychologist from the University of Pennsylvania, found that people who had a sense of purpose produced more.
• And finally, MIT’s Richard Lester studied successful, mature, large U.S. corporations to see what their secret was. He found that one of the main characteristics that set them apart was a “sense of purpose beyond profit.” (And not surprisingly, they had financial profit also.)

Having a clear sense of purpose provides many benefits.  I will show you how to find your purpose and your greatest place of contribution and profit.

Career Transitioning:

If you are in the middle of a professional career or business transition and wondering what to do next, this course is also for you.  Knowing how to translate your past Zone Fit into a new Zone of Fit should not be done haphazardly or without a specific, provable strategy like the one I teach in this course.

Moving Your Niche Online:

There are amazing opportunities available in the online space, but before you build a course, start an online business, or venture into the global economy, you need to Niche.

Janet grew up in a small town and there were lots of local business people who “wore many hats.”  General skills and General products work when the market is local and small.

But when the market is big and global, you need to niche.  As the saying goes, “The riches are in the niches.”

Even if you consider yourself a generalist and have a multitude of interests, I can still help you narrow your niche and/or at least strategize how to put it all under a cohesive umbrella.

[i] Herbert Greenberg and Jeanne Greenberg, “Job Matching for Better Sales Performance,” Harvard Business Review 58, no. 5 (1980).

[ii] Ibid., 128.

[iii] Vernon G. Zunker, Career Counseling  Applied Concepts of Life Planning, 6 ed., 1 vols., vol. 1 (Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole, 2002).

[iv] Ibid.

[v] Ibid.

[vi] J. J. Schmidt, Counseling in Schools: Essential Services and Comprehensive Programs, 4th ed. (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2003).

Frankl, V. E. (1984). Man’s Search for Meaning. New York: Pocket Books.

The End of Jobs: Money, Meaning and Freedom Without the 9-to-5 (Audible Audio Edition): Taylor Pearson, Taylor Pearson, Taylor Pearson: Books https://amzn.to/3sPH3ax

Sone, T., Nakaya, N., Ohmori, K., Shimazu, T., Higashiguchi, M., Kakizaki, M., . . . Tsuji, I. (2008). Sense of life worth living (ikigai) and mortality in Japan: Ohsaki Study. Psychosom Med, 70(6), 709-715.

Lester, R. K. (1998). The Productive Edge: How U.S. Industries Are Pointing the Way to a New Era of Economic Growth (1st ed.): W. W. Norton & Company